A recent entry into Turner Classic Movie's Friday night 'TCM Underground,' Zombies has somehow earned a 4.7 rating out of 10 at the IMDB, more than a little surprising to me. I'm figuring most if not all of this has to be for camp value, horror and zombie fans watching it because it is so bad. That's what I was hoping for, an epically bad zombie movie -- and it is -- but instead it is boring and plodding. It's not bad enough to be 'so bad it's good.' Probably still watch it though for some of the not so scariest villains I've ever seen.
Visiting her grandma (Marjorie Eaton) at her coastal home somewhere in Africa, young and single Jan (Autumn Russell) refuses to believe the claims of voodoo associated with the area, stories of the undead walking the Earth. Just off-shore, a salvage boat has arrived with plans to "rescue" a safe full of diamonds sunk at the bottom of the bay, captained by a greedy businessman, Harrison (Joel Ashley), and the man doing the diving, Jeff (Gregg Palmer). They've heard all the stories too, but plod on with visions of millions of dollars worth of diamonds too much to resist. The stories are true though, the original crew of the sunken ship turned to zombies almost a 100 years earlier. All that time they've protected their cargo, and they're not about to stop now.
This movie was bad...real bad so let's clear that up right away. It's too serious for its own good though in its ridiculousness. As a zombie loser, I can also say its "zombie know-how" is pretty weak. Everyone knows if you shoot a zombie in the head, you kill it. Apparently that doesn't apply to 100-year old zombies in Africa who are scared of fire and fire alone. Because of this knowledge, we see the cast wave torches at the slow-moving zombies or randomly shoot flares at their feet, the undead staggering backwards momentarily before continuing their lurching movements forward. "Analyzing" a movie entitled 'Zombies of Mora Tau' sounds beyond stupid so I'm not going to as much as possible. Let's just make fun of it.
There are countless sources in that department. It's really too easy, but here goes anyways. The intro, the babely if slow Jan arriving to see her grandmother. Her chauffeur drives into a zombie on the road without as much as a second thought, but Jan only freaks out once she's out of the car some minutes later. Did it finally register what just happened? Of course, there's also the possibility we can just chalk that up to the bad acting department. That seems to be the case in a lot of scenes. A line is delivered and then we get a long P...A...U...S...E while waiting for someone to walk into the room. Just tip-top directing (thank you directing powerhouse Edward L. Cahn) there in an all-around effort.
My personal favorite in the whole movie was Ashley's Harrison and his reaction after one of his men is killed by a swimming zombie. He shoots twice from the boat, hitting the zombie. Palmer's Jeff replies incredulously 'Did you miss both shots?!?' Harrison's answer? "I'm not that drunk." That's what the movie needed more of. Unfortunately it is too serious for it's own good. The mausoleum where the zombies rest looks like a big, barren warehouse, lying down in their open "caskets" (cardboard boxes). The zombies walk slowly, making a rational person think you could outrun or probably outwalk them, but not these intrepid diamond thieves. They're going to stand their ground and fight it out. There's also that whole thing about the quasi-underwater scenes which look like a camera lens was blurred to give the appearance of being underwater. It almost works as being effective....almost....okay, not really.
As a whole, there's one thing no one in the movie seems aware of. Eaton's crazy old Grandma Peters repeatedly tells anyone who will listen that these walking undead, these zombies are dangerous. No one cares, much less pays attention to her. Most of the movie's 70 minute run-time they spend questioning what's going on, even with the answer staring them dead in the face, even when Harris' wife (Barbie doll Allison Hayes) goes zombie. Eh, she'll be okay with some rest, right? Yeah, good luck with that. Maybe not the dumbest or worst movie I've ever seen, but close. Some camp value saves it from being a complete waste of time, but only barely.
Zombies of Mora Tau <---trailer (1957): */****
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